Awareness and Use of Emergency Contraception Among Women Attending Kidwany MCH Center, Assiut City

Abstract

Background: Emergency contraception (EC) offers women a last chance to prevent pregnancy after unprotected intercourse, so it reduces prevalence of unwanted pregnancies, unsafe abortions, and their consequences on women's reproductive health. Objective: to assess awareness and use of EC and identify factors affecting them. Method: A cross-sectional study was conducted in Kidwany MCH Centre, Assiut City from May to October 2018 on 400 married women of reproductive age. Data was collected through personal interview using semi structured questionnaire that included sociodemographic and family characteristics data, gynaecological and obstetrics history, EC awareness and use. Results: Mean participants' age was 32.72±7.01years. The majority (81.75%) were urban residents, 49% had secondary education/technical institute, and 73.0% were housewives. Only 27.75% had ever heard about EC. Moreover, only 38.7% of them had good knowledge about it. Medical personnel were the main source of knowledge. Only 6% had ever used EC, most of them used ECPs once at the proper time. Awareness and previous use of EC were significantly better with higher education, working women, non-consanguineous couple, more than two years duration since her last delivery, no desire to get more children, and history of unwanted or unplanned pregnancy. Conclusion: Most married women in reproductive age are unaware of EC. Among aware women, the knowledge of EC is limited, and the utilization is very low. Health education programs should be initiated and maintained for raising awareness and utilization of EC.